THE FINAL SAY
By Zach McCrite
The Endless
Story of
Tom Jurich
It never ends.
Every month, I am given carte blanche to write
about whatever I want to write about in this space.
My goal, obviously, is to write about what people
in the community want to read about when they
open a Kentuckiana-based sports magazine.
And every month, seemingly, here I am, finding
myself writing more about the ongoing sagas
(plural) that are going on at the University of
Louisville.
Some of you may be as fatigued by my writings
in this space as Cardinal fans are by the ostensibly-
boundless stories portraying their favorite school,
former athletic director and former basketball
coach in a negative light – in part by their own
actions.
Since I last penned a column for this space,
those stories continued.
It can be fatiguing for fans and writers alike.
But, it’s the story.
Courier Journal (formerly known as The Courier-
Journal) and ESPN released exhaustive stories
that focused on Tom Jurich, the much celebrated,
much debated, fired AD at UofL. I was one of a
handful of local media members interviewed
in Tim Sullivan’s Courier Journal article about
Jurich’s business tactics.
44 EXTOL SPORTS / JANUARY 2018
I could’ve used this space to give my loyal
readers the inside scoop before anyone else got
it. In fact, I should have. 2010. I was accused by Jurich, mainly, of being too
critical of Steve Kragthorpe, the coach who had,
by that time, already been fired by Tom, himself.
But, up until last month, I had vowed to never
speak of it publicly. There were numerous reasons
I never did up until recently. First, shortly after the
meeting, I felt like Jurich was doing what he felt
he had to do in helping keep me from a potential
job opening. After sulking in my new reality as it
pertained to missing out on a great opportunity, I
realized it was business. It affected me massively,
but that was his prerogative. I just didn’t know he
had that power at the time. My basic rebuttal was that it was basically
impossible not to be critical since, you know,
Kragthorpe took a program fresh off an Orange
Bowl victory and promptly went 15-21 in three
years as head coach of the Cardinals including
the most embarrassing loss I, to this day, have
ever seen at Papa John’s Cardinal Stadium, a 38-
35 defeat to Syracuse. At that time, that was the
biggest upset, according to Vegas sports books, in
college football history. Louisville was a 39.5-point
favorite that day. How could I not be critical?
And, if we’re being real, there was a part of me
that was proud of it. And it was newfound pride. I
was proud that, before the age of 30, Jurich thought
I carried a big enough stick in the market to sway
public opinion—an opinion he apparently with
which he did not agree. Up until that point, I
never thought that much of my own ability. Jurich
considered me credible.
But, the much more important reason I never
went public with this story, a story that dates back
over seven years ago now, is this: had I gone public,
listeners would take every opinion I had from that
point forward and would perceive that I had a bias
against UofL athletics that simply did not exist.
I was determined not to let it dictate my opinion
on matters of which listeners turned on the radio
to hear me. I had gained the trust of many listeners
in the area. In the media business, there is nothing
more valuable than your listeners’ trust. Why
would I want to betray that by telling a story that
would make people think I am now anti-UofL
even though I wasn’t?
Sure, people inside the media knew of my
run-ins (plural, I got calls from his department
many times over the years along with many other
media members) with the University of Louisville
and Jurich, in particular. But, I always thought
it would look like sour grapes if I ever told the
story publicly.
“Besides, Tom,” I recall asking him, “you’re
firing of Steve validates my criticisms of him,
does it not?” Jurich responded by implying that I
helped shape the public narrative of a coach that
didn’t deserve it. Whatever.
After more sparring, I walked out of that meeting
knowing that I wasn’t going to be the host of a
show I had already been tabbed by radio station
management to co-host.
It was my first real sniff of how much power
Jurich had when it came to local media coverage.
Of course, if you were a diehard, Louisville-never-
needs-to-be-criticized-because-I-simply-love-
them-that-much sort of Cardinal fan, Tom loved
you. That meant he didn’t love me. Oh well.
In the interest of fairness, Jurich’s side of this
story is that he doesn’t remember this meeting.
And, for the record, I don’t consider Tom being
a ‘bully’ to me. I guess it was just his prerogative
to not have me on airwaves for which he had at
least some level of control. I was just a 29-year-old
who was too dumb to understand that this is how
it works in some markets wher